After a career spanning close to three decades, from 1994 to 2023, Bavarian Black Metal outfit Dark Fortress decided to call it a day. One final act from Dark Fortress on their “march to the grave” was to leave their only live album, Anthems From Beyond The Grave, as their final offering to “the ancient and unspeakable forces of darkness and evil.” What a live album it is. It is an absolute legacy for their fans.
Dark Fortress – Anthems From Beyond The Grave
Live In Europe 2023 (Century Media)
Release Date: 17 January 2025
Words: Jools Green
The life of Dark Fortress was a period filled with highs and lows, which ultimately left, alongside countless memorable live events, an impressive discography of eight studio albums. From 2001’s Tales From Eternal Dusk, the most impactful for me were 2006’s Séance, Eidolon in 2008 and Ylem in 2010.
Following their final studio offering, Spectres From The Old World in 2020, Dark Fortress decided that a “self-imposed death” on their own terms was better than “zombie-lurching into oblivion” ending their existence.
They had intended to go out on a high in 2020 after the release of Spectres. But none of us will quickly forget what happened in 2020. With the pandemic putting the whole world on hold, their final tour was a series of festivals: California Deathfest 2022, Inferno Metal Festival 2022, Ragnarök 2022 and Maryland Deathfest 2022, followed by The Cosmic End Tour in May 2023.
That final tour resulted in this live offering, so as bad as the pandemic was, this live offering is one more triumph to emerge out of that carnage. Had lockdown not happened and they had called it a day after touring Spectres, they might not have made this album.
Content-wise, if you include the Intro, it is a fifteen-track offering spanning eighty-seven minutes with songs from across their career, but not in this running order, consisting of Crimson Tears from 2001’s Tales from Eternal Dusk, Self-Mutilation from 2004’s Stab Wounds, To Harvest The Artifacts Of Mockery, Insomnia and CataWomb from 2006’s Séance, Cohorror, Baphomet and The Silver Gate from 2008’s Eidolon, Evenfall and title track Ylem from 2010’s Ylem, Chrysalis from 2014’s Venereal Dawn and Pulling At Threads and Isa from their final studio offering 2020’s Spectres From The Old World.
The album closes on their superb cover of the late American composer Angelo Badalamenti’s Sycamore Trees, who was best known for his work scoring films for director David Lynch. It is an iconic piece that featured in the Twin Peaks saga and is also the outro piece 2010’s Ylem. This is a track that Dark Fortress cover very well and is particularly eerie and unnerving live.
As far as track choices go, I cannot fault anything on this setlist. If I were to have picked a list, it would have pretty much mirrored this, and everything I would have liked to see included is here, with all the tracks taken from the Rotterdam and Bochum legs of their final tour.
It summarises their career well, even if there was nothing from 2003’s Profane Genocidal Creations. I love every piece on this recording, but the pieces from Séance, Eidolon and Ylem just sit that little bit closer to me because they are my personal favourite albums.
Sound and production-wise, the quality is good. Some of the audience interaction and between-track commentary has been retained to maintain that live feel, and all the aspects of the music are clear and well defined.
Morean’s vocals come across very well, particularly his intonation and depth of delivery. Musically, it delivers that live punch too.
As someone who had the privilege to catch Dark Fortress live several times pre-Covid, where they always performed superbly, but whose opportunity was scuppered to see them one final time post-Covid due to circumstances beyond my control, then making this final live offering is a final nostalgic and special album for me.
Anthems From Beyond The Grave is an absolute must for all Dark Fortress fans.
Anthems From Beyond The Grave
Intro
CataWomb
The Silver Gate
Isa
Pulling at Threads
Crimson Tears
Cohorror
Self-Mutilation
Chrysalis
To Harvest the Artifacts of Mockery
Ylem
Insomnia
Evenfall
Baphomet
Sycamore Trees (Outro)
